Beyond Mimesis: Algorithmic Empathy as a Cognitive Prosthesis a Case Study on Early-Onset Schizophrenia and Digital Mediation. from Chaos to the Timeline: Video Editing as a Thought Organizer.

Abstract

Vocational education today confronts complex psychopathological frameworks that challenge traditional teaching methodologies. The present contribution analyzes an educational intervention concerning a student with a dual diagnosis of Early-Onset Schizophrenia and Oppositional Defiant Disorder (ODD). Proceeding from the premise that the psychotic mind fragments temporal and causal experience, the study hypothesizes that non-linear video editing technology can act as a "cognitive prosthesis" for the reorganization of thought. Through an action-research design, a protocol was implemented based on the Formative Contract and the use of DaVinci Resolve software as a "cold" and non-judgmental environment of mediation. The results highlight a significant reduction in problem behaviors and an increase in Time on Task (from 15 to 50 minutes), reaching states of Flow otherwise precluded within the classroom. The article discusses these outcomes in light of the concept of "Algorithmic Empathy," proposing the machine not as a substitute for the human, but as a transitional space (or auxilium) which, thanks to its binary logic, allows the student to clear the field of persecutory anxiety and reconstruct a shared narrative of the self.